


Jamie Grant

by DustySoul



Series: The One(s) Where Bucky is Non-Binary [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes doesn't remember, Bucky Barnes-centric, Canon Disabled Character, Gen, Gender Identity, Gender Issues, Genderqueer, Genderqueer Character, Jewish Bucky Barnes, Jewish Character, Non-Binary Bucky Barnes, Non-binary character, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-10
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-29 21:46:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3911806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DustySoul/pseuds/DustySoul
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve doesn't know where to start looking for Bucky. There's no trail, no sign of any activity from him in the fight against HYDRA.<br/>Natasha, on the other hand, knows just where to find Jamie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> These are just dabbles and character sketches in perpetration for a much longer fic I'm writing with these characters. I didn't think I was going to post the last two chapters, but I figure, why not? I mean so they're not polished and I haven't started the research I need to do or any of that. It's fine. I do what I want.
> 
> Enjoy these teasers.

He knows, without knowing how he knows, the minutiae of how to create an identity for someone who does not legally exist. And, in this, as in few other things, he feels comfortable and natural in his not knowing. He senses that this is information he was not meant to have, but that he sought out and guarded, more jealously than he guarded his own name. (Once he found out those weren’t necessary when you didn’t legally exist and that the correct one isn’t actually needed to become a person again.)

He goes to a city that was scarred by an alien invasion that changed the world and that he wasn’t awake for. They say it happened two years ago. He has a hard time thinking about it, putting it into perspective.

When he signs up for a volunteer group to help continue repairs he’s greeted by a cheery young women with frizzy brown hair and a name tag that reads “Levi”.

“I would like to volunteer. The city program?” He says, almost a whisper, before she can ask him anything.

She gladly explains it to him, asks him about his schedule, tells him about the different public transit options to get to the synagogue (where the groups meet up before leaving for work sites together). At the end, she tells him about how grateful she is that he’s willing to do this, that less and less volunteers have been staying on even though there’s still so much work to do.

He gestures at her little table, “Well, I don’t have any money… so I figure I should give my time.” And that’s not quite true, he has enough for rent for the rest of the year. He’s not quite sure what his food or utility bills are going to look like, so it’s hard to predict when he’ll need to either hit another safe house or find a steady source of income. So yeah, he doesn’t want to touch that, but he does want to spend his resources helping people. And maybe this, giving his time and body, labour and sweat…maybe it’s better.

He arrives just on time, every time. He speaks only when spoken to. He lifts the heaviest objects, takes the heaviest burdens. He learns how to level a board, how to install several different types of flooring, what types of nails are good for what. So on.

He does not laugh along. Though when standing in the synagogue, when hearing certain references, some stories, some songs, they make and tell and sing in the car… it feels like coming home.

He can only remember feeling that way when looking into a battered, bloodied, blond man’s eyes.

 

Once, one of the old woman, a motherly type, asks him…he isn’t even sure what the question means, can’t put the words together…It feels important. It feels like history. And it’s too far away. He looks into her kind eyes and says, “I’m sorry, I don’t know.” Her face falls at that, concern creasing her forehead. And he registers, too late, that the mood had been jovial. He whispers, again, “I’m sorry.” And turns his head away, to look out the window.

 

He understands, later.

She’d asked, “So what about you? Was your mom Jewish?”

They’d been joking about orthodoxy and lineage. And they wanted to know, because it was… They’d wanted to know if he fit the strictest definition of being Jewish. And it was meant to bring them together. To remind themselves that they used some other definition.

And he didn’t know, still doesn’t know, the answer to that. He can’t remember anything from before.

 

His hands know how to disassemble, clean, and reassemble every type of handgun. His eyes know how to scan the rooftops for snipers. His body knows how to seek cover.

And his heart knows what it is to ring with prayer and memory and history. But his mind doesn’t. Small things come to him, that the heritage is maternal, what challah is, what it tastes like, what “Barukh atah Adonai” means and how those words would feel in his own mouth if he ever spoke them. They don’t have real memories attached. And they don’t quite feel a part of him, as he doesn’t quite feel a part of the group.

He’s still working on an identity, he reminds himself. It’s okay.

  


March 20th he feels like he’s supposed to do something nice for himself. Though he doesn’t know why. He feels at peace. And instead of spending the dusk reading and reading and reading all about the past 70 years he walks around the shopping district, along a pier. The salty wind and damp night air smells good and he wishes this hour would last forever. When the last of the color starts to fade from the sky and the traffic picks up as the nightlife starts, he ducks into a thrift store and mills around.

He finds, tucked in between a mess of winter coats, a long, layered skirt. He stares at it for a long time. It’s a good weight, maybe ten pounds of fabric. It’s black with some shining… something sewed into parts of the hem. It’s… mesmerizing, beautiful. And he knows, this is going to be his gift to himself. It isn’t until he reaches the counter that he worries he won’t, for whatever reason, be allowed to buy it.

There is a moment of stiff awkwardness in the cashier, but he hands it over with a simple declaration of the price.

And it’s a nice routine. Volunteer, listen to the others laughing and cheering and telling each other stories. Come home to a space that’s all his own, shower, and change into the skirt. Settle in and read. It’s a good thing. The hard labour, repairs, progress. And the quiet time in the evening, reading with all but one lamp out.

And the skirt. It’s grounding, ten pounds of fabric tied around his hips, cascading down his legs, flowing around his feet, just barely not touching the ground.

And it isn’t practical to fight in. But he doesn’t care. Hasn’t cared for a long time. The Winter Soldier’s presumed dead. So’s James Buchanan Barnes. There’s only one man who can be said to be looking for him.

And he’s really looking for a ghost.


	2. Chapter 2

He can hold conversations for the sake of conversation now.

The woman (Emma) who’d first ask him his mother’s heritage asks him why he’s here, nearly 6 months in.

“It um.” He says. “It seemed like the thing to do. When I returned here… I didn’t know what to do. I had enough money to make things work for a long while, so I didn’t need to do anything about that. And I was just kind of… worried about wasting away. And this seems like the thing to do, you know?”

She nods at him, “You’re a good soul.”

He smiles. He’s not the Winter Soldier. His eyes don’t scan for snipers nearly as often, fear doesn’t roil in his stomach. He thinks he would fumble with a rocket launcher. He’s lost almost 30 pounds of muscle.

 

“I don’t remember a lot.” He tells her later. “Everything from after I came back is just kind of gone. I don’t really know what happened to me.”

“Back from Iraq?”

“Yeah. So I don’t know much. I don’t remember my parents.” When he catches a look on her face he says, “Don’t worry, they’ve been dead a long time. It’s not like I’m lost in New York when there are people who love me out there looking for me.”

She smiles at him, eyes wet.

“But I don’t remember the Shabbats. Which is why I don’t go. I know that… I’m supposed to be here and it would just be so horrible to be in the synagogue and have my heart following along but not my mind. And everyone else so put together, in it heart, mind, body, and soul.”

“Can I hug you?”

He nods. She holds him tenderly, like she would comfort a wayward soul. “Shalom.” She whispers against him.

“Shalom, Emma.”

 

The next time he greets Emma she gives him a siddur and a lists of websites to viste. He discovers he knows how to pronounce Yiddish. This is calming.

  
  


There’s someone in his apartment. I doesn’t know what makes him aware of her presents. He closes and locks the door behind him. “Are you here to kill or arrest me?” He says to the apparently empty room.

She seems to materialize from nowhere. “No. I’m here to talk to you.”

“Do you mind if I shower first?” He’s still in his work clothes, damp with sweat.

“Not at all.”

He moves around the space like he would if she wasn’t there. He puts on the skirt and a stretchy undershirt and joins her, towel around his shoulders, at his cramped dining table.

“I shot at you.” He says, feeling an… almost memory. “A couple different times.”

“Yes.” She confirms.

“Should I apologize?”

“I don’t care.” She says, “I don’t hold it against you.”

“So what is it you wanted to talk about?”

“Your plans.”

“I don’t really have a plan.” He feels on edge, hopes she’s not talking about ‘fighting HYDRA’ plans. He doesn’t want any part of that.

“What are you doing here.” She tries a different approach.

“Repairing the city. They tell me there was an alien invasion.”

She smiles. “And after that?”

He shrugs. “There seems to be a lot of death and destruction. I’ll go to the next plays that’s become the cosmos’ chew toy.”

“And when you run out of money?”

He bites his lip. “I don’t know if I can work…” He says. He understands volunteering is different from being employable but he’s not sure what the difference is and why he would be good for one but not the other.

“I have a couple options for you. You can be reintroduced to the world as James Buchanan Barnes and get enough back pay to sit tight for the rest of your life. You can come live in Avengers Tower. Or  you can stay here and let us cover your bills.”

“Why?” He asks.

“Why what?”

“Why are you helping me? Why are you willing to pay my way?”

She smiles, it looks a little predatory. “Because I can. And because so much has been taken away from you that you don’t any need obstruction the way of doing what you love.”

“I still don’t think I understand.”

“You don’t have to do it alone.”

_I’m with you, till the end of the line._

He shivers, looks away from her, her soft features, her open expression.

“Are you going to tell Steve?”

“If you move into the tower that’s unavoidable. But other than that, not if you don’t want me to.”

He nods. “He um, he’ll want me to be someone I’m not.”

“I can talk to him about that. He might just want you to be happy.”

He bites his lip. “If I… move into the tower, will you want me to fight?”

“Not if you don’t want to.”

He sighs, leans back in his chair.

“I like my place here, but I won’t mind meeting the rest of your boy band.”

“We can also give you some check ups. Does your arm need any work.”

It has been getting a little slow lately, not able to take as much weight. He nods.

“So.” He says, “I’ll be, what, you’re kept ex cyborg super assassin?”

“Basically.”

“Okay.” He’s not sure why he believes her, is ready to accept her kindness.


	3. Chapter 3

 

“I’ve always liked the time before dawn because there’s no one around to remind me who I’m supposed to be so it’s easier to remember who I am.”

  * Brian Andreas




 

Tey sleeps soundly though seldom and has accepted this as normal for this body several months ago. The hours around midnight and those before dawn are ter own. There is a stillness in the apartment building with almost everyone asleep, and those still awake stiff and groggy - not prone to comotion or activity.

The world seems unreal. Tey can’t tell if ter vision in the dark is actually as good as that in the light but tey knows it is better than it should be. There is no such thing as “bathed in shadow”. That doesn’t stop the world from being muted in blues though. It is… in those hours as if the day will never start again, even with rowdy youth and drunks hollering in the street below, even with the lights of cars whizzing by… Those hours are frozen, unchanging and static. When so much else has spun, spun, spun before tem it is nice to find something stationary. Tey holds on to it, as if for balance.

It is during those hours tey feels most at peace. The metal arm does not feel alien and freakish. The scars to not confound tem, they just are. And ter mind does not flinch back from the broken places but journeys through them no different from the rest, a part of tem.

Natasha only visits tem during this calm. It makes her seem almost as unreal as the rest of it. The first night she just is, sitting in the sofa, pretending to be asleep. Tey sits next to her, reading, before deciding to turn in. She’s not there when tey wakes, the skye just starting to turn rosey.

 

“What do you live for?” She asks tem.

“These hours of peace.”

She smiles, “Not the volunteer work?”

“The volunteer work is a world away.” Tey works at a soup kitchen most days of the week and does building and repair projects on the weekend. And the buzz of the work, the mindlessness of the monotony is a so apart of… this, these moments suspended in time. Shared with Natasha.

 

“What do you want?” Tey asks her on her next appearance.

She thinks a while before admitting, “I don’t understand.”

“I’ve just… been thinking about you. And… I know a lot of people want him dead or want to try me for his crimes.”

“I don’t want that.”

“Then… why?”

With satisfaction she says, “It has been a long time since I’ve known you, and I’ve missed your company.”

Ter blood runs cold at that. “You knew me before?” Fear cracks in ter voice. Tey doesn’t bother hiding it. Hasn’t bothered hiding anything like that for a long time. Images flash in the back of ter mind: a man, blond hair, blue eyes, face bloodied and bruised perhaps beyond recognition… but no. Falling. A river.  There’s a roaring in ter ears.

Natasha places a hand over ter thigh, “I knew you when we were both unmade things.”

And tey can breath a little easier at those words.

“They hadn’t perfected it yet,” she continues, “We were…”

She is silent for a long time before she seems to find the words, “We were the core of ourselves and nothing more. They… tried many times to destroy that as well.” She turns to face him directly. “I’m very glad to see it hasn’t worked, and very glad to see the person you’ve become.”

Tey looks down at ter hands. “I do not remember you.”

“That is alright. And… do you know me? If not, that’s alright at well.”

Tey thinks about first sensing Natasha and not even considering her a threat… And she is a presence in ter bones. Almost as far down as ter own self. Tey nods. “I do, little spider.”

 

She is gone before dawn. Not always, but today she is.

Tey covers all the clock displays in the apartment. Tey can tell time well enough by the light and lack of light. So there is nothing to think about, nothing to trouble tem. Nothing to break this sense of moment to moment. No little glowing green display to remind tem how many hours are left before the world restarts again.

Some mornings she makes eggs. Some mornings she’s still dozing on the sofa. Some mornings she’s reading ter books of poetry.

This morning tey is drawn to her absence, their conversations running through ter head. And tey has an image of her, younger, much  younger, practically a child. Tey knows a camaraderie with her built from pain and captivity and unpersonhood. It fills ter chest with emotion that’s hard to breath past. Tey knows her. Tey knows her.

 

“We were Russain together.”

Natasha nods.

“I trained you.” There are no flashes of feeling or sound or images or anything that can be called remembering. Tey knows this without knowing how. It used to be troubling, to know things without remembering them. It’s just how tey is.

“Yes.” She’s looking for tem, waiting for tey to go on.

Tey shakes ter head, “That’s all.”

Natasha nods.

 

The flowers are blooming. The trees shed petals in large gusts of wind. The city scent is overlain with that of rain. There is a sense of… Tey is hollowed, is ringing with a quiet sense of freedom. “There’s something special about today. But I don’t know what it is.”

“Would you like me to tell you?”

Tey mulls it over, the gravity of today. Ter roll in it. “No. I don’t think it’s for me, yet.”

Natasha turns away. (It’s twilight on the 14th of Nisan.)

 

“Are you planning on turning on the AC?”

“No. I don’t like the cold.”

 

He dreams of her and they might actually be memories. She’s beautiful and lithe and deadly. She resembles guns with ease, flips and throws knives with grace. Her every move is calculated and reserved without seeming to be. She turns her back to tem.

 

The next time she’s in the apartment she smells of blood.

Tey greets her, “Yours?”

“Mostly. It’s not going to stain the upholstery.”

Tey comes to sit next to her. She’s lying on her back, knees bent to give tem space.

“Do you see me as a civilian?”

She leans up to look at tey. “You’re a weird inbetween. You’ve turned your back on violence but you still have the muscle memory.”

“You’d tell me what happened?”

“If I thought it was interesting.”

“Isn’t it always? When someone gets the hit on the Black Widow?”

She smiles, fierce. “Maybe before, when you knew me. But I take a lot of bullets meant for others.”

And… this is not the Natasha tey knows. And tey is not the weapon Natasha knows.

Tey sinks back into the cushions and nods.

 

“I have a friend.” Natasha breaks the silence. She’s cooked breakfast, the pre dawn light illuminating the apartment. “He’s looking for… he might be looking for you, he might be looking for a dead thing.”

_Steve._

Tey nods.

“It brings up…” She sighs. “I won’t tell him that you’re here or that I know you if you don’t want me to.”

Tey nods.

“If you wanted to see him I’m sure you wouldn’t have created your knew live on the other side of the country.”

 

Tey wakes from a night terror to see Natasha standing at the foot of ter bed. “Hey.” Tey crokes, struggling to sit up.

“Hey.” She parrots. “You okay.”

Ter breath whooshes out of tem, loud in the dark. “No.” Tey says, as the fear doesn’t abate.

Natasha, telegraphing her intention, climbs on top of the covers to rest next to tem. She hums a familiar tune.

Her warmth, her smell, her nearness, the song… Tey drifts back to sleep before the memory forms. The apartment is empty when tey wakes.

 

“Were we lovers?”

“Yes.”

“Do… you want to be again?”

“It’s not why I am here, though I certainly wouldn’t mind. You?”

“... I don’t know if I know how to be a lover.”

“You’ve said that to me before.”

“I don’t remember.”

“Would you like to try?”

Tey nods, mouth suddenly dry. “Will you... be there, in the morning?”

“Yes.” She touches ter face, brings their lips together.

 

She’s beautiful and lithe and deadly.

But it’s clumsy and awkward and embarrassing. Panic ebbs and flows through tem. (Tey doesn’t want to be undressed, not all the way. And tey doesn’t want to be touched and doesn’t know why. Tey don’t know how this is supposed to work, how it’s supposed to go. Tey just knows it’s not meant to be like this.)

They stop with tem half hard and feeling sick, Natasha bare and exposed and holding tem while tey cries. She coos at tem until tey falls asleep.

She’s there in the morning, not out in the kitchen making eggs, but curled around ter back, running fingers through ter hair.

 

Her company, the next few times she drops in, is softer, affectionate, but not further changed. It helps tey breath easier.

 

She asks for kisses, is soft and chase, following ter lead.

 

Tey has two years of memories. Not fluid and consistent… but memories, separate and different and a thousand times more real than the flashes of things from before.

Tey is pensive on this anniversary, running through the things that have come to tem since last year. There is a greeting “Shalom” but tey doesn’t know what it’s for and hasn’t heard anyone use it. There are three addresses. “Bucky” rankles and twists ter gut. “Jamie” makes tem smile. And the third… it’s still mostly lost, but tey knows one is there. And then there’s everything to do with Natasha. That she’s Russian and tey was Russian. That they were unmade, vulnerable things together. That they were lovers, even if tey still doesn’t know how to be.

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to message or follow me on tumblr at dusty-soul.tumblr.com


End file.
